ROGUE ONE Adds Diego Luna
Variety is reporting that Diego Luna (Blood Father) is in talks with Lucasfilm and Disney to join the cast of Rogue One in a lead role opposite Felicity Jones.
The report says that Luna will play one of the rebels assigned the task of stealing the plans to the dreaded Death Star. This is the mission that immediately precedes the opening scenes of Star Wars, in which Princess Leia, custodian of the stolen plans, is captured by the evil agent of the Empire, Darth Vader.
The mission gets a mention in the opening crawl of the first movie: “Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire. During the battle, rebel spies managed to steal secret plans to the Empire’s ultimate weapon, the DEATH STAR, an armored space station with enough power to destroy an entire planet.”
During the Star Wars Celebration event in Anaheim, Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy and director Gareth Edwards revealed the plot of the first stand-alone film, which will be part of the newly christened Star Wars Anthology series of movies.
Star Wars Rebels notwithstanding — or maybe the show leads into the new movie — this mission has also been teased in A.C. Crispin’s Rebel Dawn, the last entry in her Han Solo Trilogy. In that particular story, Bria Tharen leads the rebel mission to steal the Death Star plans. While it doesn’t end well for her, it serves to set up Han Solo’s entry into the Rebellion.
There’s still no word on Felicity Jones’ character (and it likely won’t be Tharen, even though it’s essentially the same kind of part). Her character is just one of the many in what’s described as an ensemble similar to The Dirty Dozen and Saving Private Ryan. Edwards has called this “the war movie” for the Star Wars universe.
Jones and Luna are joined by Riz Ahmed as another rebel leader, and Ben Mendelsohn set at the film’s main villain.
Rogue One hits the screen December 16, 2016.
